Slow-cooker no-no

Resist the urge to lift the lid of your slow cooker to stir or peek at your meal. Each time you remove the lid, enough heat escapes to lengthen cooking time by 20 to 30 minutes.

Number to Know

30 minutes: Resist the urge to lift the lid of your slow cooker to stir or peek at your meal. Each time you remove the lid, enough heat escapes to lengthen cooking time by 20 to 30 minutes. Only open it once, within the final hour of cooking, to check doneness.

— Brandpoint

Food Quiz

What are the best foods to eat to ensure healthy eyes?

A. Carrots

B. Spinach

C. Eggs

D. All of the above

Answer at bottom of rail.

Wise to the Word

chinois: If you want to make sure your cheesecake, ice cream, pudding, quiche filling or pumpkin pie has a smooth, uniform texture, use a fine-meshed sieve or a fine chinois to strain the custard before cooking.

When a catastrophic collapse cripples society, grocery store shelves will empty within days. But if you follow this book’s plan for stocking, organizing and maintaining a proper emergency food supply, your family will have plenty to eat for weeks, months or even years. Packed with tips for off-grid cooking, canning charts for more than 20 fruits and vegetables and checklists for the best emergency pantry items, “The Prepper’s Cookbook” will have you turning shelf-stable, freeze-dried and dehydrated foods into delicious, nutritious dishes your family will love eating.

— Amazon

Food Quiz answer

- D. (An overwhelming majority of Americans — 89 percent — identify carrots as the best food to eat to ensure healthy eyes but far fewer, 32 percent, know that spinach and eggs can help support their vision too, according to a survey by Kelton/DSM Nutritional Products. Lutein and zeaxanthin, carotenoids that are found in the retina of the eye, also are found in spinach and eggs, Brandpoint reports.)